


(Not) Just Like It Was Before

by Jennifew



Series: Mending [6]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-17 02:04:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14178168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jennifew/pseuds/Jennifew
Summary: After Jack's return from The Year That Never Was, he has a much-needed talk with Ianto.  Post-ep for Kiss Kiss Bang Bang





	(Not) Just Like It Was Before

**Author's Note:**

> This is it--the last in the series! Many thanks to everyone who's been reading despite my rather uninteresting summaries.

The door opened, but it was clear from the way Ianto's expression was hidden behind that mask he'd worn when he first came to Torchwood Three that Jack's presence wasn't welcome. Still, this was important, and if he didn't do it now he probably never would.

"May I come in? Just to talk," he clarified before Ianto could say anything. "I promise, I'll keep my hands to myself. I just have things I need to say--things you deserve to know--and I need to say them now before I convince myself I don't have to. You probably have things you'd like to say to me as well, I imagine."

Ianto was silent a moment before stepping aside and letting him into the hotel room. Jack was glad he'd sprung for suites; not having a bed handy had never stopped them before, but it would still be easier to keep his promise without that much temptation right in front of him.

"All right, so talk."

"Right, okay." This was already harder than he'd thought it would be. How had Ianto managed all those months ago, when they first began? And where should he start? "First, I want to apologise."

"For what, exactly?"

"What do you mean?"

"I know what you should be apologising for," Ianto explained in that calm voice that meant he was anything but. "I'm just not sure that you do."

Jack was taken aback. "For lots of things, Ianto. But especially for leaving--I owed you more than that."

"Wrong," Ianto said flatly.

"Wrong?"

"On two counts, actually. You don't owe me an apology for leaving--I do understand that you needed answers about what happened to you, and thought that might be your only chance to get them--and you certainly didn't owe it to me to stay."

"I didn't? But we--"

"We weren't anything, Jack. Friends," he amended, "but nothing more. You didn't owe me your fidelity when you were in 1941 with Tosh--" Jack winced internally; he hadn't done anything wrong, but contrary to popular opinion, he was actually capable of tact and, since there was no way for him to be with the original Captain Harkness, he was fairly sure it would have been kinder for Ianto to never have found out he'd wanted to, however briefly. "--or your presence at any time. Frankly, we all understood why you might not want to be around the people who'd just betrayed you."

"I forgave you for that! You were all being influenced, it wasn't your fault."

"Yes, you did," Ianto conceded, "but that doesn't change what we did or how it must have felt. We didn't blame you for wanting to get away. Well, most of us didn't."

"So, what, then? I know you're mad at me, but if it's not for the reason I think you should be, why are you? I want to make things right between us, but you're going to have to tell me how, Ianto."

Ianto shook his head. "It doesn't matter."

"No, it _does_ matter. I screwed up, I know that, and while I'm grateful you agreed to go on a date with me anyway, I'd like to start my second chance right, without the past hanging over my head."

"It's fine, Jack, don't worry about it," Ianto said wearily.

"I do worry about it, though. I thought about you a lot while I was gone, and I want to do better by you this time but if you won't even let me apologise for my mistakes, I don't know what you want from me!"

"I want--!" Finally, a reaction, if quickly smothered. "It doesn't matter what I want," Ianto corrected himself. "I don't want anything that isn't freely given, because _you_ want to, not because you think you have to."

"Well, what I want right at this moment is to know why you're mad at me, if it's not for leaving. I promise not to apologise unless I think you're right to be angry, if that helps."

Ianto closed his eyes briefly and sighed. "Fine. The problem isn't that you left, but that you never gave me any warning that you might. As your friend, you owed me that. You owed us all that much. And don't try to pretend you didn't know--the timing may not have been yours to choose, but the first thing we did after realising you were no longer in the Hub and weren't answering your comm was check the CCTV. You didn't just leave willingly--eagerly, in fact--you were prepared. You knew exactly what you wanted to take with you, and where it was. You _planned_ to leave us, and never said a word."

"Ianto--"

"Forget how we felt about that personally; we'll get over it. We always do. But you left Torchwood without a leader, without even a trained Second in Command. A week or two while you were at a conference or off badgering UNIT was one thing; this was indefinite and, for all we knew, permanent. If I didn't happen to know all your passcodes, we never could have kept things running. If you'd told me that one day you might take off with no advance notice, we could have prepared, put a plan in place. But you didn't, so we had to muddle through as best we could."

Jack felt stricken. "You're right. I didn't think. I'd never wanted to be in charge of Torchwood--hell, I never wanted to have anything to do with Torchwood at all for a very long time--but that doesn't change the fact I had a duty to you all. There's no excuse for forgetting that." He stopped himself before pointing out he had, at least, told Ianto about Flat Holm; it seemed beside the point, compared to everything else he hadn't done, and anyway, he doubted Ianto would take too kindly to the reminder just now.

"No, there isn't, not when you had so much time to say something. And what if the Doctor had turned up a few days earlier, while we were trying to deal with Abaddon? Or in the middle of some other crisis? Would you still have just taken off without a second thought?"

"No! I would have asked the Doctor for help!"

"Right," Ianto scoffed. "Because he sure seemed happy to stick around long enough to find out--anything, really. Remember, I've seen the CCTV footage. He was leaving before you even reached the TARDIS."

"Okay, yes, he was, but I'm sure if the TARDIS had reported that there was something bad happening he would have stayed. It's what he does."

Ianto snorted. "Right. Of course. He'd help deal with the aliens and then swan off, leaving the rest of us to pick up the pieces. Again. Don't give me that look, Jack--don't forget, only one person in this room was at Canary Wharf, and it wasn't you. Your precious Doctor didn't give any more thought to what might become of the survivors than you or UNIT did--and unlike you, he actually witnessed the carnage. He just didn't care. So you'll forgive me if I'm not inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt."

Jack bit back his automatic protest and took a deep breath to calm himself. "You're right, we have very different experiences with him. And the current regeneration--the one who was at Canary Wharf--is fairly different from the Doctor I'd travelled with. So maybe I don't know what this one would do in that scenario. But we _all_ failed the survivors of Torchwood One, and none of us had a good enough excuse. I've already apologised to you for that, so I won't do it again, but I'm sorry I didn't make sure you and the rest of the team were better prepared to deal with things in my absence. The fact you seem to have managed just fine anyway doesn't change the fact that you shouldn't have had to."

Ianto regarded him seriously for several moments, most likely trying to judge his sincerity, then some of the tension gradually drained from his bearing.

"Apology accepted. On my account, at least. Can't speak for the others."

"Of course. And thank you for giving me a chance when you had every reason to just shut the door in my face. If you're willing, there's something else I'd like to talk to you about. Well, not _like_ to, really, but I think you ought to know, and I even think I _want_ you to know, I just...am not looking forward to talking about it. And if I put it off, I'm not sure I'll ever get up the courage again, so...is it okay if I take up a bit more of your time?"

Ianto's expression didn't quite soften, but Jack noticed concern in his eyes before he turned and gestured Jack to a chair.

"Sounds serious," he said, taking a seat himself.

Jack's mind flashed back to another time Ianto had said those words to him, and he almost smiled at the memory. 

"It is, and it's not pleasant, so bear with me." He took a deep breath, then forged ahead. "First, the easy part: when it was all over, the Doctor asked me to travel with him again. I said no. While I admit the time circuits on the TARDIS aren't very good--they were supposed to bring me back just a few days after I'd left--I could have gone with him indefinitely and returned more or less now, and none of you would have had to know. I didn't. It's true I chose finding out what happened to me over the welfare of the team, and I _am_ sorry about that, but it's equally true that I chose to come back to you at the first chance I got that didn't put anyone in danger."

"In danger? What--?"

"I'll get there, I promise." Ianto nodded, so he went on. "I won't be going into much detail, because what I'm about to tell you is just too painful, but if you have questions you can ask. I just may not answer."

"If it's that bad, why tell me at all?"

"A few reasons, really. You're the most observant member of the team, and you know me best, so you're likely to notice something's...off. I trust you. I know that if things get bad, you'll probably try and help me, and you can do that best if you have some idea what happened. Like I said, I thought about you a lot, and I do think you deserve more from me than I was giving you, and this is making a start on that. Take your pick; they're all true."

"It wasn't a happy reunion, then, I take it?"

"That's not--well, actually, no, it wasn't, but that's hardly relevant now. The short version is, the TARDIS took us to the end of the universe, where we accidentally freed a megalomaniacal, psychopathic Time Lord who stole the Doctor's TARDIS and came back now to set himself up as Harold Saxon."

"Saxon? Really?"

"Really. And the part you don't remember is that he turned the TARDIS into a paradox machine and brought these...flying metallic spheres of death from the far future, to wipe out the human race. We were on the Valiant for First Contact--the Doctor, his current companion Martha, and me--hoping to stop whatever he was up to, but he caught us." He paused; there would be no going back from here on. "We gave Martha my repaired wrist strap so she could get away. The Master used Time Lord tech to age the Doctor, eventually to the point where his body matched his age."

"And you?" Ianto asked quietly when it became clear Jack couldn't continue without that nudge.

He took a deep breath. "I spent much of the next year dying in varied and creative ways."

"Oh, Jack...."

"Meanwhile, down on the ground," Jack went on, knowing Ianto would allow him to move ahead to less painful topics without pestering him with questions and pleas to talk about what had been done to him the way Gwen would have done, "the population was decimated, in the literal sense, early on, and the death count kept rising. Those who remained were enslaved, forced to build a fleet of rockets so Saxon could move on to conquering the universe. Japan was--destroyed, wiped off the face of the planet. And for an entire year, Martha walked the Earth alone, somehow managing to stay alive while putting in place the Doctor's plan to take away the hypnotic effect Saxon had used to get elected. When the time came, the Doctor was able to reverse what had been done to him, and once it was clear he was going to beat Saxon I was able to get my guards to help me get to the TARDIS. Once the paradox machine had been destroyed, time reversed itself, so only those of us on the Valiant at the time remember any of that year. More importantly, all those people were alive again. Still alive. Whichever way you want to look at it."

"And you came back to Cardiff."

"There was a bit of clean up to take care of first, but as soon as that was done, yes, I came back to you."

Ianto took a deep breath, looking like he was trying not to appear disturbed by everything he'd just heard but failing. "Okay. Right. That's--a lot to take in."

"Ianto?"

He laughed shakily. "Part of me wants to think that's all impossible--time rewinding? Really?--and get angry with you for making it up, but you wouldn't do that. So it must be true. Which is...I almost wish you _were_ lying, for your sake. But since you aren't, there's really only one thing to do."

"Which is?"

"Ask what I can do to help you, Jack. What do you need?"

Jack's breath caught in his throat; that was, essentially, the reaction he'd expected from Ianto and why he'd told him in the first place, but actually hearing the words was almost overwhelming. He clenched his hands together to stop their sudden shaking.

"I don't actually know. Probably mostly just the sort of thing you would have done anyway, without knowing why--run interference if the team gets too nosy, keep me from getting too far in my own head...sit with me without expecting me to talk, sometimes. Most importantly, stop me from making stupid mistakes that will get people killed if it's obvious I'm not thinking clearly. It's too soon to really know how it'll affect me now that it's all over, but I imagine part of it will be either I sleep a lot more than usual as my body tries to recover, or not at all because of the nightmares. I'll probably be moodier than usual--or maybe I'll go a bit manic in an attempt to block out the memories. I've been through enough wars to know that I'm no more immune to PTSD than the next person, and that it doesn't always affect me the same way. I don't really know what'll happen, but I'll feel better knowing you're aware I might have problems."

"Always glad to be of service, sir."

"That's not--god, Ianto, you're the last person I should be asking this of, aren't you? Given how completely I failed to notice when everything I just said applied to you."

"I hardly think what I had gone through, painful as it was, compares to being held prisoner for a year and dying over and over," Ianto said diffidently.

"Trauma is trauma, Ianto; you can't really compare them like that. I failed to look out for you last year, yet here I am asking you to look out for me in similar circumstances.... I wouldn't blame you if you told me to go to hell instead. Except you'd never do that, would you? Turn away someone who needs your help? It's probably not fair of me to even ask."

Ianto moved to the chair closest to Jack's and laid a hand over his--the first physical contact between them since before Jack's ill-fated decision to run after the Doctor. It was all he could do in that moment not to pull the young man close and hold on for dear life.

"Jack, you're right--I would probably have done all those things anyway. I have to admit I like taking care of you. Most of the time, at least," he clarified with a wry smile. "But knowing you trust me enough to tell me all that...it means a lot. And while I can see your point, I can't say I agree with it. In fact, I'm probably the _best_ person to ask; since I've been in a similar position, I probably have a better idea what to look for than most. And the circumstances aren't the same--we know each other better now, or at least I like to think we do--"

"We do."

"And you've done something I never managed, and actually asked for help. It wasn't much consolation at the time, but the fact is you tried on more than one occasion to ask how I was dealing with everything. As I recall, I kept putting you off, claiming I was fine when I was anything but. I stopped blaming you for not being able to read my mind a long time ago."

"Actually, I probably could have," Jack told him sheepishly. "Psychic training was standard for Time Agents; it was never really my strong suit, but 21st century humans don't have shields, which makes it a lot easier. It's just highly unethical to deliberately read someone's mind without permission--one of the few ethical boundaries Time Agents were expected not to cross. It was...seriously illegal, galactically. They really drilled that one taboo into us, even as they encouraged us to ignore the one about using information inadvertently gleaned from unshielded thoughts."

Ianto smirked. "Psychic training was standard for Torchwood One employees, as well. I doubt you would have got anything from me. I never went beyond the mandatory course, but it was enough to know how to shield."

Jack laughed. "Always surprising me, Ianto Jones. I hope you'll keep doing so for a long time."

"I'll try my best, sir."

He was basking in the soft, dare he think affectionate?, look directed his way when a conversation from long ago came back to him. "Wait a minute--Tosh heard your thoughts when she had that pendant, but couldn't get through my shields."

Ianto looked sheepish. "My shields may have slipped now and then. At that point I was struggling to make it through the day a lot of the time, and didn't always have the energy to spare. And to be honest, it wasn't exactly a priority back then."

"So, what, you were just trying to let me off easy?" Jack teased.

"You seemed to be beating yourself up enough as it was. And the truth is, I wouldn't want you--or anyone--digging around in my head, even for my own good. So thank you for not trying, I suppose."

"Yeah, there's a reason unauthorised mind reading's almost universally illegal. If you can't have privacy in your own head...."

"I don't even want to think about that, to be honest."

"I don't blame you." They fell silent, but it was a comfortable silence; if Ianto hadn't entirely forgiven him for his departure just yet, he'd at least set it aside for now. This ability to share the same space without making demands on his attention, somehow providing support without doing anything more than existing, was something Jack had taken for granted before. He'd realised, hanging in the Valiant's boiler room between deaths, how much he'd come to rely on Ianto simply to be there, grounding him. He hadn't expected to miss him as much as he did, or to dream of seeing Ianto again so much more than the rest of the team.

Jack wasn't sure when being friends and lovers had stopped being enough for him, but if opening up to Ianto now and then was what it took to forge more, he suspected it would be worth the effort.

**Author's Note:**

> The Last Beacon came out today! While I doubt it'll quite be one of my favourites, on first listen I like it SOOOO much better than anything I heard from the previous batch of the monthly Torchwoods (which tended far more towards horror than I like). And GDL managed to do something I thought impossible: write Owen in such a way that by the end I didn't completely hate him. Who knew?
> 
> (Not to mention a single line--two words, really--whose existence I adore. The fact GDL wrote them in a story that appears to be set in early S2, since AFAICT Owen's still alive, makes them even more interesting, because who would know Ianto's mindset better? I never would have expected him to say those words, in that context, in public--much less in front of Owen. I like being wrong. :))


End file.
